To Shift A Nation, pt. 1

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Craig Docksteader, author of "To Shift A Nation," joins us to explore how Christians can effectively work for lasting change in our country. Discover practical strategies for spiritual and civic engagement in part one of this insightful series.

Transcript

fundamentally, that it's starts here. We have to rediscover our confidence in the gospel. And when I when I say the gospel, I don't just mean let's lead people in the sinner's prayer so they can go to heaven after they die. I mean the gospel of the kingdom that Jesus preached. That the kingdom of God is not just something we're waiting for to come someday, but the kingdom of God is present now and it's growing. And we have a role and responsibility in it. Everything we see [music] in the nation we don't like is a absence of the kingdom of God. Welcome to Prayer Stream, [music] a podcast from the National House of Prayer in Ottawa. We're here to have conversations with leaders [music] and authors about prayer and how it intersects with the local church, politics and government, Israel, and anything else that might pop up in the news. Join me, your [music] host Brad Fittler, along with Chris Byberg, as we wade into the prayer stream. All right. Hello everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Prayer Stream podcast. I'm your host Brad Fittler with Chris Byberg. Chris, say hi. Hello everybody. Great to see you. Yeah, so thanks for joining us. You may notice that we have an additional

face on the screen today. Craig Dockstader, we're so excited to have you with us. Craig is is the author of a book to shift a nation. It's going to be backwards, but that's okay. You can look at it for now. We'll put the information about this in the show notes so you can see where to find this, but we've invited Craig on today to talk to us about this book. When I first read it two years ago, I said to Chris, Chris, it sounds like you wrote this book. It's uh saying a lot of the same things that that we think that we carry and but you say it in a in a different way, unique way. So, Craig, thanks so much for being on the show with us today. Hey, it's a real pleasure to be here, Brad and Chris, and uh thanks for inviting me looking forward to our conversation today and uh lots of great things to talk about out of the book for sure. Exactly. So, Craig, let's start with tell us a bit about who you are. Tell us Yeah, who you are, your family, what you do, and tell us your journey, what brought you to Ottawa. Uh so, I'll I'll keep that brief so we don't cover the whole hour because I >> [laughter] >> Uh so, my my uh my background actually I started [clears throat] I started in full-time

ministry as a pastor back in the '80s. That'll give you an indication how how old I am. And uh pastored for about 8 years and then God over a series of circumstances shifted me into the marketplace. It's like he closed the door for pastoring. We continued to pastor but no longer paid for it. So, I needed I needed income. Needed to eat. >> [clears throat] >> I ended up working for an organization that was called the Association of Saskatchew Saskatchewan Taxpayers. And this was my introduction to life outside of the church, work in the marketplace, and also the political sort of public policy realm. Up till this point in time I had no knowledge, no interest, no involvement at all in any of this. In fact, to be honest, when I started with that organization, I didn't know the difference between a member of Parliament and a member of the Legislative Assembly. Somebody said MLA or MP, I would know what's that acronym. Like that's how much attention I paid to politics. And that's I'm not proud of that. But But that's that's where I was at and uh when I started with this organization, it was really the start of a real a real learning curve for me. And what happened is that organization

eventually became the Canadian Taxpayers Federation as we expanded to other provinces, Alberta, BC. My wife and I Gail got transferred around quite a a for a little while. We've had lots of mailing addresses over the years, [laughter] lots of precedent. And so, it was during this time that a lot of the things I'm going to share about the process of change or that I share in the book, that's where I learned it. It was actually not in the church, it was in the place of needing to promote change in the public square. And later I began to see the application of the same principles to the church and just to to change in general. And and then after so, we actually went through three different non-profit organizations over a period of I don't know, 15 close to 20 years, I guess actually. And then we really felt God calling us to to Ottawa. And in 2013, we uh we moved here to Ottawa. So, I've been working on Parliament Hill ever since. I worked for a member of Parliament for a while, uh then moved over to the to the Senate side. And I currently I work on the Senate side as director of policy for the uh leader of the opposition in the Senate. Okay. That's pretty cool. >> That's a bit of my

story. Okay. So, you've been in Ottawa for about for 12 13 years now. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Okay, good stuff. Now, what led to the writing of the book? Yeah. So, the writing of the book was uh a combination of things. It was combination of inspiration and frustration. >> [laughter] >> So, on the on the inspiration side, I just felt knew that God was depositing things in me through all of my experience, all that I had walk through, through what we had discovered in the in our experience in the the public policy organizations. And uh >> [clears throat] >> and and then and then my beginning to see the application of that to the church. And as I would try to explain some of these things to people, I never had enough time. We >> [laughter] >> you know, and I thought I I I just need to get this down in writing. I need I need something I can pass to people and say, "Read this and then let's talk about it." And so the the book really came out of that, but there was also another aspect to it, which was the longer I was in Ottawa, the more I saw things from this side. So, on the other side, first in the church, then in the organizations, and now I'm a sort of behind the veil, the

government side, you know, like that opaque place nobody's sure what goes on except what they see in QP. And >> Right. and seeing how Christians view the process, how they understand their role, how they interact with with the whole political and public policy process, and to be honest, seeing some mistakes being made over and over again and a misunderstanding of what is effective and what is ineffective. So, all those things sort of converged to >> Just to be clear, you're saying mistakes in the church and how we're going about things? >> made by Christians. Okay. Yeah, that's really interesting you you say that because so often we see people because they're following especially now because because of the invention of echo chambers. Right? We have these all these echo chambers, we believe that certain echo chambers carry more truth than others, right? And as a result, we become these armchair quarterbacks, right? So, we're not really in the game, but we think we know, but we don't necessarily know because we are not actually exploring everything to its fullest. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, the the echo chamber thing is a real issue, honestly. It's Yeah. Yeah. We might get to that. So, we

probably will. So, this actually kind of leads really well into the the opening of the book. So, your first section of your book, which you call pursuing national change, you note how over the past few decades, it's like there's been a bit of an awakening in the church as far as the importance of our engagement in the political sphere, but if we look over the last 10 years, it can look like we're actually losing ground as far as Christians, evangelicals in the in the political space. It can look like we're losing ground. So, why do you think that is? You mentioned some mistakes are being made. Why do you think we're it seems like we're losing ground? So, there's there's a It's It's often to be honest, it's often difficult to condense it down, but I'm going to do my best. Because that's why people have to buy the book. I mean, you know >> [laughter] >> you get the whole story. Precisely. Because on the one hand, I'm convinced that scripture teaches us that the kingdom of God is continually growing. But, that doesn't mean that we see the impact in the same way in society. And so, on the one hand, when I speak about mistakes and you know, not seeing the change that we wanted. In fact,

in the book, I talk about how things have gotten worse, not better. And now, that in when I talk about that, I'm not referring to the work that God is doing. I'm referring to what we see in society. If we go back 30 years, it was a very different society. Christians were viewed very differently 30 years ago than they are today. Today, we're in a position, we all know, where we're not sure all often how welcome we are in the public square. We're not sure if our voice is is wanted or desired. In fact, we're pretty sure it's not. We often feel pushed out of the public square. And so, we you know, we saw numerous policies change over the last 10, 20, 30 years. And so, in the book, I I say, "Look, we've been doing the same thing to some degree over and over again. It's not gotten us to where we want to be. So, we really need to step back and take a look at at this. >> [clears throat] >> Surprisingly, that in spite of like you're saying, Brad, there has been a an increase in the involvement of Christians in the public square over the last, again, whatever time frame you take. You could you go back 30 years and see it. We really saw an uptick in the US first, and and then gradually it

happened more more in Canada, where you saw Christians say, "I got to run for office. I got to get involved in in politics. I need to be in the public square." And all those are really good things. But, it didn't result in the change we were looking for. The change we were hoping for, right? So, if we've gone about pursuing change the wrong way, how does change happen? How should we expect change to happen? So, in my book, I I focus on one main thing to really in terms of what we did wrong, which leads into what we should do. And the first thing was that I really saw that And again, this No, you can't make any blanket statements cuz people are at different places. Not everyone says Someone's going to say, "Well, I didn't see it that way." And that's fine. I agree. But, in general, what I saw was that Christians were were were what I call looking for a king. And how if we if we go back to the book of Samuel, where where the Israelites suddenly thought, "We need a king like all the other ones." There was a good reason why why they wanted a king. And it has some real parallels to to today. Their their leadership was corrupt. Samuel's sons were supposed to take over from him, and they

were corrupt. They were unrighteous. They were People looked at this and said, "We don't want these guys leading our nation. We need a king." So, they they they they basically talked Samuel into it. And of course, God was very unhappy. But, the idea was that if we could change what's at the top, it'll trickle down, and it'll make our lives better. It'll fix everything. There's always some truth to that. We can Right. But, it's not the it's not the solution. It's interesting you bring up that portion in Samuel in 2 Samuel 23. Samuel's not happy with the decision, right? Even though he sees and he realizes why they make the decision. And this is this is this is kind of an Inhop's Inhop's wheelhouse here and Samuel says to them, you know, I don't like I'm going to paraphrase, I don't like the decision, right? In fact, I don't like it that at all, but I'm still going to pray for you because if I don't pray for you it will be a sin, right? It's a sin if I don't pray for you. And so, even when we see, you know, righteousness, unrighteousness, right decisions in leaders, wrong decisions in leaders, you know, there's this thing where we see the voice of the Lord coming forth, we want you

to pray, you need to be praying, you need to be engaging in prayer. And so often we move away from this and we look to we look to great ideas that will fix our nation when Samuel's saying, "Listen, what you really need is we need to be praying and partnering with God in this situation." >> Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. And this is the that wrong focus I saw reflected on the part of many Christians. Just thinking if we just get a different prime minister, you know, we just need more Christian MPs. And where what the book goes into is that we we need more Christian MPs, but it's not the solution. The solution is bottom up, not top down. The solution is to understand that unless we change the culture, unless we change the atmosphere, sphere, unless we shift the values in the nation, the government at the top reflects what's coming up from the bottom. So, if we we can't think we're going to fix it from top down, it has to come from bottom up. So, I spend quite a bit of time in the book, you know, like a full chapter just laying out this sort of idea how change can happen quickly or slowly and it can happen from the top up or from the bottom down. And my thesis is that long-term

constructive change that is sustainable in nation comes slowly from the bottom up. We often want it quickly from the top-down. And sometimes that's how we we view revival, right? We think if we just get revival, it's going to change everything. No, it's going to change a lot in the church, but it takes time in society. We have to understand what to do. That's right. I find there's there's sometimes Christians will point to the Old Testament and look at, you know, when Judah got this good king, look how everything changed. Yeah. And it's true that happened under kings like Isaiah, under Josiah, under, you know, some good kings. But two things that stand out to me about that. One, they always reverted back to their old ways after that king was gone. Yeah. And so even if that king lasted 40 years, if we bring that forward to our context, even if that were to happen, it's no guarantee to continue on beyond that. Every 5 years we could have a a new government, every 5 years or less. So it's not it's not the source of long-term change like you're saying. And the second thing is, as you already alluded to, based on our system of government and how it's representative of the people, our

government is downstream from culture, it's not the other way around. The king, the prime minister doesn't set culture, it's a reflection of the culture cuz we vote them in. So yeah, any kind of lasting change, like you say, has to come from the ground up, has to come from the people in the nation, not the leadership. Yeah. When when Stephen Harper was prime minister, this story has gone around quite a bit in Christian circles, how he was pressed to, well, you know, do something about the abortion, the lack of any law governing abortion. And he basically said, "Look, I can't do anything until you do your job first. You you have to create a fairly overwhelming consensus at the grassroots level, and then we're able to reflect that in public policy. Until you do that, we can't do it." And that's a perfect example of how the change that is what happens in law is reflecting something that's happening in the country. And And this is the second thing I point out in the book. Like first they're looking for Christians in Canada have been looking for a king, but secondly, we've often been unaware of the real shifts that are happening in the nation. We've been unaware of the culture. Like we

we're aware of it sort of out there. And by the shifts I mean shifts in the direction it shouldn't be going. The uh the because we're often focused in our church, we're focused with our family, we're focused with our relationships we live in a little bit of a bubble. We read the newspaper, but we always think that well, those those those things are fringe. But the the move towards you know, the what I'll call the secularization of society is far more mainstream than we have realized. And as a result, we've kind of ignored it and it overtook us before we were really even in the game. When we see it the results of an election, for example, I know many of many of us pile on and we we do an election prior strategy and we want to see change. But actually when you see these changes this this election, you're actually seeing what's in the heart of the nation. Exactly. When you see these results, God is not going to reach into the ballot box and magically change the voting. He's not going to do that. He won't we we are free will moral agents. He's not going to get in there and switch stuff. So he's going to be doing things based on how we choose. And so when we see policies go a particular

ways or elections go a particular way, it's an indicator or a barometer of where the heart of the nation lies. Yeah, exactly. I'm I in the in the book I use the statement that government is a mirror and a megaphone. It's a mirror because it reflects back to us the state of the nation. You're You don't like to look at your government, you're looking at your nation. That's the state of the >> [laughter] >> But But government is also a megaphone because they have the loudest voice in the room. And so, it matters who's in government. It like it matters who's holding the megaphone. It's not like we can say, "Well, let's just go home and pray and until God changes things." We have to be involved in prayer and in the public square. We need both of them. Yes. And I find it interesting even just uh the example you used of Saul and Samuel and how, you know, Chris, you're saying God's not going to magically change ballots in the ballot box. God gave Israel the king they were looking for. You know, when he chose Saul, he chose Saul based on this is who you want. You want the tallest guy, you want the strongest guy, you want the best-looking you you want all these factors that humans are

looking for. And that was uh you know, that was a big mess. It didn't work out well in the end. But then when God chooses his man, it's the guy that everyone overlooks. Yeah. >> And you know, he he did it based on what he saw in the heart of David, not not what he saw in the outward features. And and I just find that interesting. He gives us like you said, Chris, he gives us the government we vote for. I think it's Rob Parker who would say God gives us the government we ask for. Yeah. Right? And so, if we're not if we're not actually petitioning him and we're not actually asking for a good government, we get we get what we didn't ask for in a in a sense, right? And it's and it's really interesting how we are so crisis uh oriented that we will move into that place, oh my gosh, we're having a problem, we jump on and then so quickly fall asleep and not be that grassroots people or even better, I like this this mustard seed people, right? That we're in that place and growing because if you saw mustard grow, it starts little and it spreads all over the place, right? That's where we're supposed to be and be continuous and in there for the long haul, not looking for a crisis to jump in

and a crisis to jump out and go back to sleep. That's That's exactly right. The other interesting thing about Saul is and it it took me a while before I realized this cuz I had that same sort of perception that the nation of Israel rose and fell depending on who the king was, but not really understanding what was underneath that, which was the king was often a reflection of where the where the people were at. Like if you read >> Okay. about the the kings who were the worst, you find find that the the nation was in a terrible state already. Right. And the story of Saul kind of reveals that because Saul, as we know, made some pretty serious mistakes, which resulted in in him losing his kingship and God withdrawing his anointing from him. And each time he did that, and there was two very specific ones. One's when he was offering the sacrifices he wasn't supposed to. Then there was the other time. Both In both cases, he did it because the people were pushing him to. Right. >> The people were The people were afraid, and then he got afraid of what they would do. So, he was responding to the people. And the people were responding to fear. And so, because of where the people were at, that

determined what the king ended up doing in the end. So, it really Right. >> it sort of illustrates that bottom-up principle, which we know isn't always 100% true. And there is top-down change that happens. We saw in COVID, right? You want to talk about top-down change. Everyone stay home. Don't go to work. >> [laughter] >> That's That's top-down. It It happens, and it's real, and it does change things, but it's not sustainable. That's right. Well, that was seen in COVID as well because you had that that top-down change with restrictions and social distancing and stay-at-home and all that, and you saw a lot of Well, we saw people revolt against that. Yeah. >> people get fed up. This is too much change too fast, and they pushed back, right? And that I think that goes to your point of change that's going to be lasting has to be gradual and like you said from the ground up. And however, in that time even though there were many voices that that were pushing back against it, was over 70% of the population said this is reasonable. These these restrictions are reasonable. It's not my personal opinion, right? But that was there. That was in the psyche that the vast majority of Canadians

said, yes, this is good and didn't even pay attention to the restrictions on free. Okay. So we've talked about, you know, you kind of unpacked that a bit, how how change happens, okay? And if we've sought change from the top down and that hasn't been working as well. We've sought to you know, let's get it let's get a good leader in place and that'll help all the change happen that we want to see. That hasn't really worked out for us. So, what is God's strategy for change? So, what I what I contend, the position I put forward in the book is fundamentally that it starts here. We have to rediscover our confidence in the gospel. And when I when I say the gospel, I don't just mean let's lead people in the sinner's prayer so they can go to heaven after they die. I mean the gospel of the kingdom that Jesus preached. That the kingdom of God is not just something we're waiting for to come someday, but the kingdom of God is present now and it's growing. And we have a role and responsibility in it. Everything we see in the nation we don't like is a absence of the kingdom of God. Our role, we are solely responsible for the the growth of the kingdom on the earth. I mean, you know,

non-Christians aren't going to do that. And yet they would benefit from it. And so I I spend that whole sort of there's three parts to the book. The second part of the book deals with this, looking at change from God's perspective, how he called us to be salt and light and leaven. And we look at these things though when we say, "Ah, it's too slow, or it doesn't it's not very effective really. I tried that once." And we we have to get beyond our own sort of failures and we have to get back to the recognition that we're talking about something that God has put in place, that the spirit of God has been sent to the earth to produce the kingdom of God through his people and regain the confidence that if he's called us to do that, then he's equipped us to do that. And if he's equipped us to do that, what does that look like? How does that translate in into real life? So, in like in a that's the that's the core of it. And I I spent quite a bit of time in the book talking about things like like for example, the Lord's Prayer. The Lord's Prayer is is often seen as begging God for things, you know, please, please, please. And yet, if you look at the if you look at that scripture in the

Greek, we find out that it's there are no requests in that prayer. They are all declarations. It's written written in not as questions, but as declarations. And that's that's a something that we don't realize, but it tells us something about what It's not that we're commanding God to do things. It's that he wants us to operate out of the place of confidence. He's teaching us something about prayer, that prayer is a partnership. Prayer is not is not just a constant oh, please, please, please. There's a place for petition, you know, there's a place for supplication, but there's also a place for declaration. There's a place to say, "God, you said this and I'm in agreement with you." And so we position ourselves in that place of being partners with God. And what happens here in Canada is in large part dependent on us as Christians learning to be the people he wanted us he wants us to be. That's my contention. In all areas of life, so often we think of things as sacred and secular. And when the reality God wants it all. Exactly. Every part of life, right? In the Shema, love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might, with all your strength. He wants

it all. And he wants to be in every part of society. And so often we say, and this is this is where where secular comes in. The secularists say, you stay over here and we'll stay over there. The church stuff stays inside the building, right? And we're happy. But that's not what God's asking to us. He wants to be that leaven in every part of society. He wants to be in everything. He wants to be in your kids hockey game. He wants to be in politics. He wants to be at school. He wants to be involved in your workplace. Yeah, exactly. So for us to say preaching the gospel means I have a pulpit and I have a preach. And that's not it at all. It's only that's only a very tiny sliver. That's exactly right. In the in the book I at the end I give a brief tell a bit of the story of my wife's experience. She worked at Walmart for a number of years. Part of the purpose of that telling the story is look, it doesn't matter whether you work on Parliament Hill like I do or at Walmart like my wife did for quite a while. That God wants to use you in those places. She saw incredible things happening operating as a cashier. Like this is she wasn't manager. She wasn't in fact she she said no to various

opportunities where she could have moved because she wanted to be and she felt God wanted her to be where the people were coming through the line. She worked right through COVID. Walmart never closed down. She worked all the way through it and and the the stories she has of two three minute conversations and how it would change things for people. They would come back again. She would have people lining up at her cash to wait in line and other cashiers would have an empty line and her man her manager would say to these people, "Look, that line's open. Why don't you go over there?" She says, "Because we want to go through her line." [laughter] Because there's something about life and light and joy and peace and encouragement and all of these things. When Gail came home from Walmart the very first day she said to me, "I realized today that a little bit of hope is a lot of hope for people. A little bit of encouragement is a lot of encouragement for people." She just she saw it right away and and this is what what you're saying, Chris. Like we're not talking about have to be a preacher in a pulpit. We need to be in every sector, every area of society. Whatever God has given us to do a a

mom at home, a teacher in the school, a fireman, a police officer, you know, whatever God has equipped us to bring the kingdom into those areas. Amen. Let's Let's spend some time drilling down on this idea, Craig, of of being present, of bringing the kingdom where we are, wherever we are. Because I think one of the things that we seem to where we've seemed to stray, I think, is that many times in the church we put higher priority on large-scale ministries, on ministries that are reaching tens and hundreds of thousands from large platforms and we diminish the importance of being a being a light dispensing greeter or cashier at Walmart. Like let's let's drill down on Chris, you mentioned the the mustard seed element of the kingdom, the leaven of the kingdom. This I'm thinking of you you started with this Craig about just about we want things to go quicker and we don't we don't take the time, we don't do the work sometimes. I'm reminded of Psalm 84 where where it says blessed is the man whose heart is set on pilgrimage. Not the man who's set on a 100 meter sprint or you know, something quick like that, but whose heart is set on I'm in this for the long haul and it describes this

journey and going through different places and different seasons and so on and they appear before God in Zion at the end. So let's let's drill down on this a bit if we could, just the the importance or the idea of the kingdom at the small grassroots level in our day-to-day life and just the importance of bringing the kingdom where we are. It's so it's so fundamental. It's like we don't we like the suddenly's and the suddenly's are important. We need the suddenly's, but every every parable where Christ talks about the kingdom has this organic element to it. The the farmer sowing the seed, the the the mustard seed growing like you were saying Chris. Like how it's the whole idea is this is going to take time. The the the man the landowner with the servants and he's going away and he's going to leave them with responsibility while he's gone. Time elapsed. Yes. It took time to do what needed to be done before the return. He returned as king. And it's so like it's so it's such a fundamental part of scripture, but it doesn't mean there's not those suddenlies. It doesn't mean we don't we don't have these things that happen quickly, but it means that even when those happen, usually they're

the result of laying this foundation, sowing the seed time after time after time. We We do often look for that suddenly. I think that's kind of why we want the king who will come and change everything because I think secretly under the surface it means it's less work for us. Right? Like if if a king shows up and makes us all become Christian, then I don't have to I don't have to witness to my neighbor. Or I don't have to be salt and light in the workplace. Maybe that's Maybe that's mean Maybe I'm overstepping, but I think that's part of it is that it's less of it. It's less work for us when God just breaks in and does it. Well, you know, the interesting thing about with ENHOP and the ENHOP story, you know, when when Stephen Harper was the Prime Minister, we had no problem filling that building. People came from all over. They loved to come because they loved to pray for Stephen Harper. They thought that was great. And then there was change. And then it was they didn't like the change. They didn't like this And And for In our story, they stopped coming. They go, "I'm not comfortable with this. This is not good. I like praying for the stuff I like. I don't want to pray for the stuff

I don't like." And as a result, he had to ENHOP had to make serious serious changes on how we did things and they had to sell that house, right? To move to a different type of platform, which we're working on now, which turned out to be maybe the purposes of God. This is kind of cool. But, we we just so often forget that it's not We think it's real fast. We want a flash. We want a quick fix. We want it all to be better so we can live happily ever after and go back to what we were doing. There's some real truth to that. I The other part of it is I do think And you guys, know you guys agree with this. There's a longing in our hearts for that day. There's a longing to see the fulfillment. But we have to hold that intention with the fact that it's not now. The kingdom is now and not yet. Right. It's it's the emerging growing kingdom. And it's it's interesting Chris like what you're saying about when Stephen Harper was Prime Minister because it's very true. One of the things that I saw working on Parliament Hill and it was only for the last couple years that we were on Parliament Hill because 2013 to 2015 when the election was and and the conservatives lost lost government. >> [clears

throat] >> In that period of time 2013 to 2015 sort of this working on this side of of government and and actually we we lived at the National House of Prayer for about a year and a half during that time. So we kind of had a foot in both worlds here where we were in the prayer room and we were on Parliament Hill. And what I really noticed was people were discouraged by the lack of progress that they thought they would see. At the beginning of Harper's term it was it was like it was almost like everyone came to and hopped to cheerlead. You know, because it's easier to pray for things when you feel like yeah, we see things happening. We're gaining ground. This is great, you know, you know, we got the office of religious freedom. We got this happening, this happening and we're pre we're protecting you know, unborn children overseas and not at home unfortunately. We did >> [laughter] >> we did cut back some funding for some things that should not be funded. But there was a sense of momentum and so that momentum really like you know, what let me diverge here for a moment. We we lived in Regina for about 20 years Gail and I. >> [clears throat] >> And one thing that we we were Roughriders

fans. And that in that season the Roughriders Saskatchewan Roughriders were not winning at all. And it was the attitude is very different when you're sitting in the stands and your team is losing season after season after season than when you're in the stands that it Sorry? I said I'm a Leafs fan. I get it. >> [laughter] >> When your team is winning, it's like, "Yeah, let's go to the game. Let's be there. Let's cheer them on." So, there's there certainly is an element of that. But, what I saw near the end of Stephen Harper's time in office was that more and more Christians began to become discouraged. And as they became discouraged, they began to step back. They stepped back from prayer. They stepped back from supporting him politically. In fact, in the 2015 election, there was a lot of Christians that did not vote for him. And because they felt like, "No, he's not doing enough. He's not doing what we thought he should. We need to send a message here." Well, message received. Look where we are today. You know what? Craig, you're reminding me of a story. So, a few summers ago, Chris and I, with Marilyn and Melissa, we we were out in Saskatchewan, actually, in the summer. And we met

with an MLA. I think we can we can tell this year. He was First This is the summer of 2022. So, first of all, he hadn't been to church in months because everyone there was really nasty to him over government stuff through COVID. So, that was the first first thing that was concerning is why are Christians being nasty to a brother for any reason, right? The second part of it, though, was he was he was telling us a story about There was some event happening, some pro-life event happening, that many Christians felt the provincial government wasn't being supportive enough about this event. And they were really really nasty to the to this this member in particular on on social media. And what he told us was He said, "Christians don't understand that we're not the majority, right? And if we want to see change along the lines of our values, it's going to take work and building bridges with other more moderate voices in the government who will work with us." And he said, "When some of these colleagues of mine have seen how Christians have been attacking me online, they're going, 'Why would I want to do anything with this group if this is what it's going to get me?" And he said, "Actually,

by complaining about this one event that we didn't go all in on, they were supportive of it, but not all in like some in the pro-life crowd felt they should be." He said, "By responding the way they have, they don't realize they've set the pro-life movement back 30 years in our province." Yeah. Exactly. And this is This is a fundamental like that's an excellent example of how if we don't understand how change happens, then we don't understand our role in the public square, and then we do the wrong things, and we don't get the fruit we're looking for. Well, in James James chapter 1, and this is a lesson that we learned very very early taking on this role here, you know, in the middle of COVID, lots of everybody was not happy. Just about every I had I don't remember meeting any happy people. You didn't shop at Walmart and see Gail. I should have because we're called to be hope dispensers. And so, but it's the anger of man. James says the anger of man not produce the righteousness of God. And we we think we have a license to act like the world, right? This is what the world likes as I so we should act like the world and then think we're going to have kingdom fruit from it, and we

won't have this. Right? So, one of my favorite verses I think in the last little while it's come from Romans 15:5. We know 15:13 the God of hope fill you with all hope and joy. But before that, it's the God of endurance and encouragement, right? That is where we should be abiding. That comes from the from John 17 abiding. You know, that's where this come up because we with when we are abiding we get the endurance and the encouragement. Yeah. That's exactly right. This whole pro-life issue is actually a very very significant for us, I think as Christians. And it's it's it's a bit of a what would be the right word, but almost like if we can if we can get it right there, like we can understand our role and our responsibility, what we can do, what we should you know, what's constructive, what's not constructive, how do we navigate that issue in the public square, it will inform a lot of our thinking on a lot of other issues as well. Right. >> There's in Faith teens recent book, she tells the story about what happened with the whole abortion issue when it when it came it came to the Senate because when when Mulroney tried to the court struck down the existing law governing abortion. So

Parliament was supposed to draft a new one. So Mulroney did draft a new one. It passed it passed the House of Commons. It went to the Senate. The reason it did not pass the Senate the the single reason it did not pass the Senate is because there was a core group of Christians who were lobbying against it. The reason they were lobbying against it is because it did allow abortion under certain circumstances. So it was the all or nothing kind of approach. Instead of seeing the incremental approach. Take the incremental steps. So they were I don't want to use the word threatening. That's a bit strong, but you know how it is when people are lobbying they're like they were lobbying senators to not vote for this bill because if they did, they were supporting abortion. That was that was the line. And as a result, we lost that by one single vote. I need to fact check that, but that's what I've been told. It's the you know, when we see legislation like for years we we we warned and warned and warned since I was a kid that if medical assistance I and dying comes in, it'll be a slippery slope, right? But this is the other way. This is becomes a magnetic hill, right? When we get a foothold, we

can go up a little higher. So, we win one little portion and we get more and we get more. It's a Margaret Thatcher said this. Like we can we can bring legislation that'll be good, but it only keep it down here. But if we bring righteous legislation, it'll bring us up. It'll pull our nation up to righteousness. And and so often we throw the baby out with the bathwater. Yeah, right. Exactly. I think that's Well, that's huge, Craig. Like this this thing of we sacrifice a little bit of, you know, a measure of gain cuz we're not getting the whole thing all at once. And think I think God does work incrementally. I I know he does with me. I mean, I've seen how there are things that the Holy Spirit has put his finger on in my life early on in my walk with him that he didn't put his finger on for somebody else right away. And I, you know, I've got a story of this from a woman who's in our church who incredible testimony of what God had brought her out of. But she used to and she she's since passed, but she she used to share all the most vile memes about Justin Trudeau that that came across. And some nasty language and all sorts of stuff like that. And I I remember thinking judgmentally and

critically about it. But then but then the Lord was like, "But do you see how she See how she obeys me in this area and this area and this area better than you do?" And it's this thing of it's this thing of we expect, you know, we look at someone else and go, you know, God got a hold of their life. So, now they got to do everything perfect. And it's like, "Well, I know with me, he's gracious and he deals with one or two things at a time. And he works incrementally. And I think that's his kindness to us and that's his his care for us. And I think we should probably approach change in the nation the same way. Would you agree with that? Just look for incremental change? Yeah, 100% agree. And the other thing is to to realize, going back to this, that we can't It's actually not good idea to get ahead of where the where the where the nation is. We would like it to be, you know, we have to go back to is there support for that? Do the values of the nation support that? And this is a this is a difficult thing for us as Christians because we have we [clears throat] have, you know, the Bible tells us that like we understand that everybody's made in the image of God, even the unborn. So, so to

to destroy a life, it doesn't matter whether that's a preborn life or one that's already born, as Christians, we know God views it the same way. Yet, we live in a society that doesn't understand that at all. And so, how do we navigate that place? And I don't think, honestly, I don't think we've really come to terms with that yet. We still see it pretty black and white in it. We have to understand how to function in what is predominantly a religion of secularism in California. Right. Right. How do we How do we function in that as Christians in an effective manner? One of my favorite Well, I wouldn't call it a favorite movie, but a a very poignant movie is Schindler's List. And at the end of the movie, Schindler was remorseful because he did some things, but he's looking back and he says, "I could have done this. I could have done this. I could have done this." Because he understood the incremental in the increments that he was moving in. And so, he had some wins, but he could have had say he saved some lives, but he had he had a better wisdom and understanding, he realized he could spend to save even more lives and not saying all or none, right? He was content with the increments,

and we need to saying like let's let's do this one bite at a time, one piece at a time. Let's move this along. Let's get some wins. Let's save one life at a time. It's the If I don't get them all, then they all can die, which is which is which is not wise. No. No. And even how in that example like you're saying like he was he was grieved over the losses he perceived he could have had as wins, but he didn't realize all the lives he had saved and how celebrated he was because of because of the incremental steps he did take. Yeah. And so sometimes we I think it goes back to that thing of we fixate on if we're not reaching 100,000 at once, then it's not worthwhile. Actually, to reach one at a time is incredibly worthwhile. Yeah. And we need to value that value that as much as we value the Billy Grahams and people like that. >> Yeah, exactly. I love that story of your wife working at Walmart and making that kind of impact on people's lives. That's huge. Because that doesn't come from listening to a preacher on a platform to 100,000. That comes in the interactions. That that makes a huge difference for people. She had a She had a coworker who was Muslim. Lot [clears throat] Lots of

ethnicities on the staff there and she had a coworker who was Muslim and I forget the I forget the situation, but anyhow, I think she she fell or something, hurt herself. There was some kind of serious health situation. That coworker told her husband, "Go to Walmart, find Gail and ask Gail to pray for me." Like That's how That's how phenomenal [laughter] That's pretty cool. Someone's going to Christian. You know, and that's that's what she thought of because of Gail's witness and Gail's testimony and Gail's love for her that she could see that. And that's the kind of thing to for all of us to take into the public square wherever we are, wherever we work. And I'm just If I can just jump to this, too, it's uh it's It fits in this, but it's kind of I point I was thinking of earlier and it's a quote from from the book that I think is one of my favorite quotes and I I it written down here so I cuz I don't have it memorized. If there's one thing in the book that I want people to take away from it is is this. We must have a response that addresses the brokenness of our world and doesn't simply compel people to comply with Christian standards and lifestyles when they have no power to do

so. We We have to have a response that addresses the brokenness of the world. And the one >> One of the things I refer to is medical assistance in dying because medical assistance in dying I think is an is an awful thing. Yeah, it's an understandable thing for people who don't know God and have no hope. But I think medical assistance in dying is as much as a reflection of our failure to really apprehend what I'll call the anointing for healing Yeah. as it is for anything else. And I know there's different there's different, you know, theologies on this, but I'm I'm just so convinced that there is so much more available to us as Christians that we are not yet tapping into. That we can't allow these things to discourage. We have to allow them to motivate us. Motivate us to press into God for more, to be more effective in our witness, more effective in our prayer for other people, more effective in seeing lives change. That that's really at the core of things. You know, I was at I was at on medical assistance in dying. I was at a national leaders event a couple of years ago and they did a presentation on this. This is this is shortly after the the the bill became a law and there were

still many many national leaders, many national leader ministries that had no idea about this and I don't know how they didn't know, but they just weren't paying attention. So I was sitting at this around table, five or six leaders, and we watched the presentation and I said to them so fellas, what are we going to do about it, right? They were like, well we're going to we're going to write our MPs and we're going to write our senators and we're going to do the No, no, no, no, no, no, but what are we going to do about it? How are we going to care for these people? And I said to this, I said it's not medical assistance it's not in dying, it's my assistance in living, right? How am I going to be that person that comes in between to be to be to bring life, to bring hope, to bring those things. If we're just sitting there wringing our hands, writing letters, which are effective, and you know, I'm not saying not to do this. But you need to be involved in these situations. You need to again, back to the grassroots, act to the mustard seed, back to the leaven. I I worked in in like you, I have very similar similar experiences, Greg. And I was working in doing ministry and I was working in

the in the marketplace and I had this woman come up to me one time and because I was very free on sharing the good things that God was doing in my life, right? I wasn't preaching to anybody. I was just telling the story of my life and the story that was ongoing. And she said to me one time, she says, Chris, you know, it's like your life is magic. And I thought that was brilliant thing because when you are on the outside looking in and God moving in those areas, it's miraculous. Yeah. It's magical, right? And that's where we're supposed to be. We're supposed to be the people of righteousness, peace and joy, right? And bring it into those painful, hard situations. I just love the fact that Gail has people coming to pray for her, right? That because that's the testimony of Jesus. That's the real thing of That's what ministry is. That's it. Being the hands and feet of Jesus. That's so good. So, Craig, I think this is a good place for us to leave off for this one. Craig, can I just get you to read that quote one more time? And just I I love that thing, having a response that meets the the needs of the world. Go ahead. Go ahead with that. We must have a response that addresses the

brokenness of our world and doesn't simply compel people to comply with Christian standards and lifestyles when they have no power to do so. So good. Yeah, it's Yeah. Nice, Craig. >> [laughter] >> All right. So, that's that's that's good for today. Everybody, thanks for joining in, for listening in. I encourage you to come back. We're going to do another session here with Craig. Hear some more from from the book, more from his heart >> [music] >> on this. So, if you enjoyed this conversation, stay tuned. We'll we'll see you again next time. Thanks [music] for listening to Prayer Stream, a podcast from the National House of Prayer. Click the like button, share, and subscribe to stay [music] up-to-date on all our future episodes. For more information on upcoming events, prayer resources, or the Canopy of Prayer, please visit us [music] at www.nhop.ca. See you next time.